Tie remover



Nov. 2, 1937. H. s. 3mm 2.091430 TIE REMOVER Filed Oct. 12; 1933 2 Sheets-Sheet 1 Jig/7] 'j firozzfiz Nov. 2, 193 7.

H. 5. BROWN TIE REMOVER Filed Oct. 12. 1955 2 sheets-Sheet 2 fi A; 9kj

as 4e 6E 40 i J6 w K MW/A Patented Nov. 2, 1937 UN'l-TED STATES PATENT OFFICE TIE REMOVER Hugh S. Brown, Harvey, Ill., assignor to Hubron Company, Inc., Somerville, N, J a. corporation of New Jersey 3 Applicationoctober 12, 1933, SeriailfNo. 693,241

4 Claims. (01. 143-43 1 The present invention relates to apparatus for sawing has never been. practical heretofore be-.- and the method of removing ties, and in some of cause unless .a .great dealof ballast was removed its broader aspects to the general art of sawing. from betweentheties andeven from underneath According to the illustrated form of this inventhe ties, .the saw was. likely to be completely 5 tion, a disksaw is carried on a vertically pivotal ruined with. a single operation. In fact, it is, frame, together with means such as a motor for possible that, in .many.instances at least,-several. rotating said saw. The framemay conveniently saws would have to be.used 'for;a single tie. Any be pivoted to and detachable from the end of a deep disturbance of the ballast under. thetie is railroad section car. Carried by the aforemenvery 'objectionable, because itis. thenextremely,

tioned frame in the plane of the sawdisk and difficult to. get. proper support for. .the new tie, 10

pivotably mounted in positions such that they i. e. support which will not. settle under the efmay be thrust against the edge of the disk are fectof traifi'c. Probably the most. common protwo rotatable wheels, one a tooth-forming wheel cedure heretofore has been the expensive proand the other a sizing wheel. These wheels are cedure of. removing all of the ballast from one made of hard metal, whereas the saw disk is side of the tie to a level far enough below the made of a decidedly softer metal such as soft bottom of the tie so that the tie could be knocked iron. According to the preferred method of prolaterally to this hollowed-out position'of thebalcedure, the saw is first prepared by rotating the last and then removed endwise from under the, saw by the motor at high speed, formingor re-, railh Even this procedure is sometimes extremely forming the teeth on the disk by turning the difficultdue tothe close spacing of the ties,and it; 20 lever in the direction to press the tooth-forming is always slow on account of the obstruction of wheel against the disk and then trimming the the rails, so the labor cost'is excessive; It is sides of the teeth by pressing the sizing wheel therefore an object of the present invention to onto the edge of the disk and into a shearing provide suitable apparatus and a suitable method overlappingw engagement with its periphery. for removing the ties with the utmost economy 25 Thereafter, with these two wheels disengaged the and with the leastdisturbance to the bed of balrotating'saw is pressed against and through the last. tie just inside of each rail without ordinarily-hav- With these and various other objects in view, ing to remove ballast from under the tie. Then the invention may consist of certain novel feathe center portion of the tie is removed by raising tures of construction and operation, as will be 30 it between the rails and the end portions are remore fully described and particularly pointed out moved by knocking them out endwise from under in the. specification, drawings. and claims apthe rail. Because of its contact with the ballast, pended hereto. the saw disk is quickly dulled, but because of its In the drawings, which illustrate an embodisoftness it is rarely if ever nicked, and it is alment of" the device, and wherein like reference 35 most instantaneously sharpened by use of the charactersare used to designate like parts,

tooth-forming wheel and sizing wheel. Figure 1 is a somewhat diagrammatic side .ele-

In the past the most expensive part of revation of the apparatus; placing the ties has been the removal of the old Figure 2 isa plan View. of the structure shown 40 ties. Probably the chief reason for this is that in Figure 1 40 the tie or tie plate is usually imbedded or counter- Figure3 is an end view of the structure shown sunk into the tie so that it is'impossible to simply in Figure 1- and illustrates in addition the points knock out the old tie endwise. In fact this is at which the tie is cut; 1

sometimes prevented by the ballast alone. This F ur i ustrates the method of. removal of difliculty could be overcome by jacking up the 45 rail, but this is subject to the very serious dis- Figure 5 is an al V ew Of the Sizing Wheel; advantage that other ties are raised, with the Figure 6 is a cross sectional v w hroush the result that ballast falls under them and prevents line of Figure v their settling to theiroriginal positions. The re- Figure i a View Of tooth-formlng 50 sult is that ahump is left in the rail which obwheel; a j viously is undesirable'for modern railroads hav- Figure 3 Cross s alv w along t e ine ing high speed trains. The procedure of sawing 8 Of Fi ure through the tie adjacent the rails has been con- Although, myinvention may take'many forms,

templated (see Patent 1,732,568 to Robb), but only oneihas been chosen for illustration. This 55 Lil form has been shown as used for cutting the tie I0 and as supported on a motor section car l2 running on the rails l4 and I5 supported on the tie plates l6, under which the tie I0 is positioned. The working element of the apparatus is the saw disk I! which is carried on one end of a shaft I8 mounted in suitable frictionless bearings (not shown) in the hub 20 at the end of the frame work 22, which frame work may conveniently be supported at one end by a re-' movable bolt 23 about which it is pivotable vertically. The bolt 23 may be secured to a casting 24 which may be mounted on bars 26 so that it'may be slid lengthwise along said bars. Said bars may be supported in any suitable'manner from the hand car, as by means of brackets 28 and stud screws 38. Extending upwardly and rearwardly from the hub 20-: is asuitable handle 3| with which the frame and the disk/ saw carare keyed to their shaft, but the disk saw I! is,

held sufficiently tight by a nut 40. Mounted on the frame work 22 is an upstanding bracket 42.'

Mounted on the stub shaft 44 extending through the bracket 42 is a plate 46. Pivoted at the ends of this plate 'by stub shafts 48 are the toothforming wheel 50 and the sizing wheel 52. The plate is keyed at its center to the shaft 44 to which in turn is keyed a handle 54. Swinging this handle in either direction willswing either the tooth-forming wheel or the sizing wheel 52 into engagement with the periphery of the saw disk [1. Normally these wheels are held out of engagement with the saw disk by a spring detent or any other means, not shown; The forming wheel 50 is of a simple construction shown in Figures 7 and 8 and is made of a relatively high' iron or other metal of 'about the same hardness.

In the process ofbeing pressed into the saw disk to form the teeth thereon, the forming wheel 58 presses burrs laterally so that they project from the face of the disk. These burrs are beneficial if they do not project too far,jsince they take the' place of the set of an ordinary saw disk in cutting a slot wide enough to provide sufficient clearance for the saw. However, it is of course desirable that these burrs be uniform in size and that theyshould'not be so long that they will be easily'fiattenedout. Therefore, after the tooth-forming wheel 50 hasbeen used, the lever 54 is swung in the other direction and the sizing wheel 52 is pressed against the periphery of thesaw disk and into overlapping engagement therewith. Due to the overlapping engagement, and due to the rotation of the saw disk and the consequent rotation of the sizing wheel this wheel trims the burrs to the desired size.

' This sizing wheel, which is also made of a fairly hard metal, preferably the same metal as that of which the forming wheel 50 is formed, has formed therein a peripheral slot 60 of the right width for the saw tooth. The flange to each side of the slot 60 is preferably notched with wide cut-outs 62 leaving the wide tooth segments 64. The tooth segments 64 of the. two flanges are preferably staggered with respect to one another. The wheel 52 should of course be pro- 'vided with a suitable hearing such as the self-' lubricating bushing 56 similar to the bushing 56 of the wheel 59. There is no one definite metal that must be used for the wheels 58 and 52. It issufiicient that they be hard enough to form the teeth properly on the disk saw II, which in turn must be hard enough to cut through even hard wood in-the ties.

When the saw disk I! has been sharpened in the manner indicated, or when the teeth therein have been originally formed in' that manner, it

is ready for use in-removing: the ties; Accord-.

ing tov this use the saw disk is in the lateral position illustrated, i. e., adjacent the rail H or-- its tie plate I6 if one is used; The saw being rotated'by the motor is'lowered by the handle 3| to' cut through the tie, making the cut 10 therein; The frame work 22 is thenslid along the support bars 26 to a position near the rail l5 but sufficiently far therefromso that the pulley 32 will not hit the top of said rail as it isbeing lowered. In this position the saw disk I! is lowered V to again out through the tie, forming the cut 12.

Once more the frame work may be shifted, this time to a position such that the disk will form the cut 74 adjacent the rail I5 or its tie plate Hi. In this position the pulley 32, orsperhapsthe hub 20 will strike the top of the rail and prevent the saw disk 11 from cutting entirely through the tie; The center section 16 being released from the rest of the tie by the cuts Ill and 12 may be lifted upwardly and'removed; thereafter the end portion 78 of the tie may be split, as with a spike maul 80, and a chunk 82 adjacent the tie plate l6 removed. This unlocks the end portion 18 of the tie so that itmay be knocked lengthwise outwardly from under the rail. The end portion 84 may likewise'be knocked out from under the rail without any further special treatment. Of course if itshould be desired, the saw disk may be sufficiently large to cut entirely through the tie even though the hub does strike the top of the rail. There'are objections to this, however, so that it is preferred to use a'disk of about 22 inches, and, when the rail is too high for this saw, to cut through the tie to use the process described. 7 Another alternative would be to use two saw disks, one for each rail, the'hub for each disk being located on the side. of the disktoward the center of the track.

In instances where this invention is to be used with a rail car provided with a motor for its propulsion, the motor illustrated herein may be omitted and provision made for driving the saw disk from the motor of the car. One manner of doing this is to provide apulley on one of the driving wheels of the car, jack up these driving wheels and drive an intermediate shaft from said used during the sawing process if sufficient power is provided to maintain the speed of the saw disk.

It is to be understood that many other embodiments of the invention, including some in improved form will be apparent, and in the course of time more will be devised by those skilled in the art. It is not desired that this invention be limited to the details described, for its scope includes all such forms or improvements as come within the spirit of the following claims, construed as broadly as the prior art will permit.

What is claimed is:

1. The process of removing a tie from a railroad when it is locked against lengthwise movement by countersinking of the rail into the tie and when it is adjacent to hard objects which would be detrimental to the teeth of a saw, which comprises: preparing a soft steel saw disk by molding teeth thereon by rotating the same against a rotatable hard steel tooth-forming wheel, subsequently rotating the disk against a rotatable sizing wheel arranged to engage the periphery of the saw disk in overlapping relation and constructed to trim off the burrs from said teeth to a predetermined size, and thereafter continuing to rotate said saw, sawing through said tie adjacent to the inside point at which the rail is countersunk therein, and at a point inside of the other rail, removing the central portion thus severed from the tie by lifting it between the rails and thereafter removing the end portions of the tie by a lengthwise movement.

2. The process of removing a tie from a railroad when the track structure is countersunk into the tie which consists in cutting a central portion from said tie, cutting into said tie adjacent the countersunk track structure and on the inside thereof, removing the central portion of the tie, splitting an upper chunk of the remaining end of the tie from its inner end face to said last named cut and removing said end portion by lengthwise movement thereof.

3. Apparatus for removing railroad ties comprising suitable framework supported for pivotal movement in a vertical plane, a soft steel saw disc rotatably mounted on said framework,

, said saw disc being capable of movement into cutting engagement with the ties upon pivotal.

movement of said framework, means carried by said framework for rotating said saw disc, an upstanding support secured to said framework adjacent the saw disc, and means carried by said upstanding support for forming teeth on said saw disc, said teeth forming means being shiftable into and out of engagement with the saw disc,

4. Apparatus for removing railroad ties comprising suitable framework supported for pivotal movement in a vertical plane, a softsteel saw disc rotatably mounted on said framework, said saw disc being capable of movement into cutting engagement with the ties upon pivotal movement of said framework, power means carried by the framework for rotating said disc, an upstanding support secured to said framework adjacent the saw disc, a shaft rotatably mounted in said support, means fixed to said shaft and rotatably carrying at one end thereof a tooth-forming wheel and at the other end a burr-trimming wheel, whereby said tooth-forming wheel and said burr-trimming Wheel are each shiftable into and. out of engagement with the saw disc.

HUGH s. BROWN. 

